5 ⭐️ for the content and engaging style.

Very valuable in helping to understand the mechanisms of migration in Latin America. Jason spent 6 years among and studying the culture of human smugglers.

The word “hope” in the subtitle is misleading. It‘s not hope for the crisis ending, it‘s the hope both migrants and many smugglers have of escaping desperate poverty & violence.

Now downloading his first book which is focused on migrants.

I was tempted, except nobody but me would see them under my pant legs. 😜

34% in and I can tell this is going to be a very memorable and informative book.

Violence is the handmaiden of poverty.

🫣 What wild satirical ride on the Victorian Horror Bus! Imagine the Bronte sisters unleashed & unhinged.

Loved it as a spoof! 😳

Wow, what amazingly beautiful prose! Has that very southern story telling tradition vibe about it. I‘m am going to pick it up in print when I find it to read the other stories in this edition.

I really enjoyed listening to this family mystery, particularly because the secret unravels in a nonlinear fashion. The ending is also not unnecessarily drawn out or wrapped up in a shiny bow. My favorite type of ending!

@Cathythoughts you might check this one out. 😊

A reckoning of two people and a marriage in a pool. Well done!

Page by page! 😅 Definitely can get bogged down in this giant middle section, but there are spectacular nuggets here & there. OT has ratcheted up the tension at the end of book 5 so we‘re definitely headed somewhere. 😬

Tepid pick for IRL book club. The narrative starts out strong and the ending is good, but the middle meanders with descriptions of other worldly beings and landscapes without much character development or plot.

The best line was the MC realizing he couldn‘t trust alien shepherds because after all, the cyclops were shepherds too. 🤣

Was using the foil of sci fi for spiritual philosophy a new thing? (1938)

For me, this is one of the rare instances when the film was better than the book. The film was more intense from minute 1 and you can‘t beat the gorgeous cinematography & acting which made it so visually appealing and compelling.

Hands down my favorite baking book.

Make this coffee cake, you won‘t regret it! Here is a link if you don‘t have the book.

https://www.kingarthurbaking.com/recipes/our-favorite-sour-cream-coffee-cake-rec...

Super cringeworthy!

I‘m torn because I appreciate the creativity and the fact it‘s thought provoking, but the writing lacks nuance and gets repetitive. I feel like a broken record when I say it would have made a better novella. Also, the end was silly given what we know about Doug‘s character.

I wonder if this will be made into a film?

Oh, my. I‘m only 26% in and it‘s really uncomfortable! 🫣

The third audio narrator of the series is introduced with this installment. I liked the previous two, this one not so much because the voices aren‘t as distinct. The pronounced French accent meant distinguishing among the several French names was difficult to track, but that‘s no fault of the narrator.

This story sprawls across many locations and characters, and as a result there was too much explanation of connections rather than showing.

What could be better than going with my daughter to listen to my husband play with a jazz singer in a venue selling books? It was in celebration of African American history month. Fun! 😄 My daughter got to chat with the singer about SZA & Lamar, so it was a win for her.

Loved this interview! Fascinating - I didn‘t realize she was such a student of history. https://youtu.be/vNvVsl5OZ7o?si=MZKRupR7TAuD_Bhy

Halfway mark! 😅 If you want to build your vocabulary, look no further than this monument to words.

“In the beginning was The Word” - no joke. It‘s all about letters, words, and language and communication and perception, or lack thereof.

Light thumbs up. It‘s hard to go wrong with the friends of Three Pines, but this one was just okay.

Reread with IRL club and it was a raucous good time, lots of fodder for laughter and discussion.

Once again struck by the highly relatable themes. Humanity hasn‘t fundamentally changed.

😢😭

Oh the the sick & sad irony re: a raiding officer had 1984 in his hands and didn‘t know what it was about, had to ask the shop owner.

https://www.npr.org/2025/02/14/nx-s1-5294328/israel-raid-bookstore-east-jerusale...

Okay, the “torturous” initiation rites of the Bogomil sect wherein they are subjected to pagan plays made me laugh. (All things earthly and pleasurable are sinful.) Such as those featuring Lady Baubo, who is the ancient goddess of mirth & obscenity & laughter.

Oh the evils of hedonism! 😂 Google to get the full pic!

IRL bookclub pick. One member bailed and “hated” it, the rest of us agreed Oyamda effectively achieved her purpose in describing the inane dehumanizing impact of the corporate world.

Don‘t expect high action or deep character development. That is not the point. 😉

“Trying would be their life‘s work.”

So very good! 💔How can we recover from our mistakes, even those most ordinary of human failings? We all think we‘re special in or miseries and joys. But are we?

This one falls under the feel good balm category.

Robert Seethaler is an auto buy author for me. 👏🏾 If you enjoy understated, spare, quiet, reflective & all those similarly lovely adjectives, you‘ll appreciate his writing style too.

I‘ll be living with Olga for awhile. (10 weeks as a read along) Slow going because I have to make a note or look up a word every other minute.

What a ride! Halfway thru Book 2 and I‘m a bit nonplussed by the mysticism of Kabbalists. “The air is full of eyes…” 👀👀👀👀

I wanted to like this, but it is coming off as pretentious. Maybe it‘s my mood. Just not invested and I‘m 61% in.

Continued on with the series. It‘s entertaining enough to listen to during workouts. I won‘t likely remember it. 😏

Beverages & books are an escape from reality.

Loved the first book of Jacob! It couldn‘t be denser with ideas & threads. I am delighted & tickled with the humor. 😄

5⭐️ Wagamese so effectively captures the heart wrenching destructive trauma of the Indian boarding school policy.

I knew I was going to like this because I enjoyed Medicine Walk. Deft writer! Lyrical and sensitive despite the subject matter.

#OhCanada
@Jess861

Feeling Asher‘s misanthropy today.

New IRL bookclub is a fabulous group of smart & funny people. I am really looking forward to future book dissections, I mean discussions.

I “enjoyed” Conrad‘s novella for what it is/was in its time. The literary criticism from various writers included added food for thought. I argued with them via pencil. 😆

This is a pick for the importance of the subject matter - the crisis of crimes against indigenous women. #MMIW

There were aspects of the writing I found distracting, but that is a quibble that pales against the importance of raising awareness.

What a fantastic title page!

Fiction is the great lie telling the truth…

Spot on articulation for why writing & reading “fiction” is important. 👌🏾 I could listen to Verghese all day - so insightful & relaxing. Bet his medical students like him.

https://youtu.be/-zBo7Fl-iL8?si=NnX_laxXa1ScN5zb

What splendid evocative writing! The excerpt pictured is from page 1. I‘m only on chapter 6 and I am going to savor each and every one.

#OhCanada
@Jess861

This is a fun a race against the clock to solve a murder & save an innocent man from a public hanging! 🏇

Aside from some diversions about cricket, I really enjoyed the writing. Definitely anti-death penalty, Cornwell doesn‘t spare any of what is repulsive about it.

I notice Cornwell is (was?) prolific, but alas seems most of his books are war centered?

I think I‘ll be occupied in the kitchen this year. 😊👏🏾 Doesn‘t take much to make me happy.

Is there such a thing as exquisite pain? If so it‘s here in Toni‘s writing. The exchange between Nel & Sula after their estrangement wherein they compare their life choices & consequences is a knife to the heart. So poignant because both women are telling their truths, though so very different.💔

I have to spend more time thinking about this one. Sula is difficult to like for her narcissism & nihilism. I can though admire her self actualization.

Good writing, but relentlessly depressing. I can‘t finish now, but perhaps I‘ll come back some other time. It might also be the narrator‘s voice which is suitable to the tone of the novel. 🫤 Just not the right book at the moment.

Agree with @Ruthiella this one is a soft pick mainly because I didn‘t find the 16 year old Addie‘s novel entertaining. It would have been better had only excerpts been included. But, the comedy at the end had me laughing and guffawing out loud. High melodrama! #FurrowedMiddlebrowClub

There is a twist in this novel that is slowly revealed to the reader, which was an element I enjoyed. Also, lots of food & nature descriptions. ❤️ Not sure about the ending; seemed a bit contrived and convenient.

So relatable! How many times have I asked where the day went because there is no accounting for it?

😆 I needn‘t have felt bad about bailing on this one. It was essentially a flop for the bookclub. Only two actually managed to read/listen to the whole thing.

Amazing this is a debut novel! It feels like a bit of a mashup between a traditional American Western & an organized crime novel, but set in contemporary rural NW England. As odd as it sounds, it works. Gritty and sometimes gruesome, yet there is also the natural beauty of the fells.

Thanks @Cathythoughts for your post. Had it not been for you I would have bypassed it because of the cover. 😜

I puzzled over Pamela walking in on the lawyer searching the “davenport” for valuable assets. 🤔 Why would he and how long could it take to poke through the cushions of a couch? 😆

In America “davenport” is an old fashioned word for couch/sofa, which my grandmother used and is the only reason I am familiar with it. Apparently in the UK a davenport is a writing desk. I would have recognized it as a “secretary.”

#FurrowedMiddleBrowClub

Ooofta - this little piece is slow going for all that‘s packed into it. I can only read a few pages at a time to absorb it.

This caused me to snort out loud! 😆 #Furrowedmiddlebrowclub

#Mtcookbook And that‘s a wrap! 66 recipes made from 43 cookbooks from my shelves in 2024. 😋

Last night was an adapted fried rice; I used the cashew chicken recipe from the tagged book and everyone loved it, excepting the vegetables according to my daughter. 😏

This was a fun challenge and thank you to all who indulged my posts!

I could not put this down! Whipple has an exceptional ability to convey the emotional lives of her characters with such realism. Not for a minute did any of it feel like fiction; it was like being a fly on the wall. That is until the end. I suspect had this novel been written today the end would be quite different. Still, a 5⭐️read!

This novel has the best description of a cozy happy family Xmas I‘ve ever encountered. Just picture perfect.